Food (1992) User Reviews

"A distorted reality is now a necessity to be free."

[heitor_caramez · 9/10 · 9 April 2013]

What strikes me about this movie it is how little I can give to make much sense of it. I guess it has some social comments on it, about our consumption and our consumerism society, on life and everything else. But most importantly, it doesn't really matter, you get to just experience, pay attention and to be in that state of not getting it. I think that might be the experience to have, unlearning things. Turning them upside down, to transform them. In a personal level it affected me, after seeing a sequence of his shorts and this one, to be more conscious on how we act and driven our desires, you know that feeling of salivating when you think about a bacon sandwich, it has stopped, and it was interesting to be that far apart, to change that programming to one that wasn't completely destructive and irrational.

All this conversation, reminded me of that Elliott Smith song called, "A distorted reality is now a necessity to be free."

Just eat it!

[lee_eisenberg · 7/10 · 29 August 2006]

Jan Svankmajer has portrayed many wacky things, but "Jidlo" is a whole new level. Portraying bizarre things happening during each meal, he goes all out. The first vignette "Breakfast" seems to be a slight repeat of his earlier movie "Et Cetera". The most eye-opening vignette is "Lunch", in which two men at a table can't get the waiter's attention, and resort to eating their plates, utensils, clothes, and even the table...but they don't intend to stop there. With "Dinner", Svankmajer decides to be grosser than the Farrelly brothers could ever dream of being.

Maybe this isn't Svankmajer's best movie ever, but it's still worth seeing.

He's outdone himself again!!!

[planktonrules · 9/10 · 18 January 2013]

Jan Svankmajer is the most unusual stop-motion filmmaker whose work I have seen. Instead of the typical models which are brought to life using this method, Svankmajer takes everyday objects or creepy stuff he's found, perhaps, in antique shops to create films that are truly unique.

I hate reviewing the films of Jan Svanmajer, as each time I see one of his films I am convinced that it's THE weirdest film the man has ever made. And yet, time and again, I find I am wrong, as some other film of his turns out to be even weirder. This is definitely true of "Food"--a truly bizarre and fanciful film that is really impossible to describe--you just need to see it for yourself. I will TRY to briefly explain what the film is like. As in other Svankmajer films, this one uses stop-motion but in this film it's mostly to animate people--making them move in a very jerky and robotic manner. What, exactly, they do is beyond belief but always involves the eating process. It consists of a segment about several different meals and all are VERY creative and ultra-strange--so strange that you might want to show this one to others. And, unlike a few of his films, this one is okay to show to most kids--it's creepy but in a very cartoony way. And, interestingly, it also uses some claymation which is blended into the characters. Very much worth seeing--especially if you are a bit weird yourself (which I happily am). I assume that this is NOT for everyone's taste.

Not to be missed!

Wonderful comment on human consumption...

[scarletminded · 10 May 2004]

May contain spoilers.

This film is divided into three sections: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. Breakfast is an amusing piece where people become dumb waiters. It reminded me a lot of City of Lost Children or Delicatessen, creepy views down a shaft in the middle of someone's body. As one eats from the other person, then they switch roles.

Lunch has two men who are hungry at a restaurant. The waiters won't wait on them so they start to eat the flowers on their table and soon start eating their plates, their clothes and the table. One of the men is prissy and well to do, the other is poor and dirty. I got the feeling this had something to do with the class struggle and how it is often ignored (hence the waiters) and it ends with the well to do guy wanting to eat the poor guy.

Dinner has people eating their own body parts. This part reminded me of the Brothers Quay, especially the use of the wooden arm. It reminded me of martyr painting, where a women had her breasts or eyes on a plate. A man is going to eat his penis too, but he covers it, even in eating your own privates, there is shame!

All three parts take a look at greedy human consumption, how we use people and money, how we take things for granted. I really enjoyed it.

Jan Svankmajer eats his shoe, among other things

[Quinoa1984 · 10/10 · 29 August 2008]

It's an apt title and solo-focus for Food to be a Jan Svankmajer short; he's obsessed with it, in case you couldn't tell from his other movies (it's used sometimes to ridiculous amounts in Little Otik), and in both playful and gleefully deranged ways. In this short we see his knack at mixing live-action and stop-motion as two gentlemen at a table have plates of food and eat them up... then they eat the forks, then the plates, then the table, then the chairs, not to mention their clothes, and we see how their mouths suddenly flip over to stop-motion for just that bit of mastication and then back to the real human forms. There's also the great bit with the man as a kind of cash-register of food as people sit down and at the flick of a button on his jacket get plastic forks and other things to munch down on their lot of good. Sometimes its disgusting, and at the end when actual body parts get in the mix of things (including, not too undeservedly, a penis and testicles, which actually are the dividing line that isn't crossed) it's downright crude, but it's downright raunchy and crazy and quintessentially Svankmajer. The icing on the cake, of course, is the Blue Danube used as the two naked men munch on their table.

Unforgettable

[Bored_Dragon · 9/10 · 25 July 2019]

Until an hour ago, I never heard of Jan Svankmajer, and at this moment I still have no idea of who he is and what he did, but after this unforgettable experience I will definitely explore it. This short movie combines live-action with stop-motion animation in a morbidly fascinating way, and while it is quite disgusting and sick, it is at the same time mesmerizing and thought-provoking. I think I figured what the author wanted to say, but I do not want to go into an analysis of the "story" because it is better if you see the film without any knowledge of what awaits you, and then get your own conclusions after your impressions settle. And the impressions are guaranteed to be strong. Take my word when I tell you that this film is worth 15 minutes of your time. It left me speechless in the most positive sense.

9/10

Breakfast was the best (most hilarious) meal

[guisreis · 8/10 · 22 April 2021]

Very funny surrealist partially animated dark comedy. It is divided in three segments with independent weird situations: breakfast, lunch and dinner. The first one is by far my favourite, and I would give it a 4.5. I laughed out loud! Luch is also good, and reminds me the style of another famous film by Svankmajer, Virile Games/Manly Games; however, it is the less impressive, and I rate it with a 3.5. The dinner segment, the shortest, have a 4.0 and it is quite funny and cheeky.

We are what we eat... and how we eat it.

[Pjtaylor-96-138044 · 8/10 · 15 November 2023]

'Food (1992)' is a Czech short film comprised of three distinct segments: breakfast, lunch and dinner. The first involves a man entering a room and following a bizarre set of instructions to receive his meal, the second follows a pair of diners who are unable to get their waiter's attention and decide to eat whatever they can get their hands on instead, and the final is about a series of high-society people who are so focused on the extravagant garnishes they've been provided with that they fail to realise exactly what it is they've been served (or, perhaps, they just don't care). Initially, director Jan Svankmajer wanted to create this short back in the 70s, but was unable to do so due to the Communist rule in his country. By the time the 90s rolled around, the Velvet Revolution had occurred and the filmmaker was now free to create what would become a scathing commentary on the very people who prevented it from being made in the first place. The subtext of the picture is very clearly anti-Communist and each segment has a distinct theme targeting different aspects of the political movement. On top of its messaging, the piece is just an engaging and fairly bracing display of unconventional filmmaking. The live-action picture is created primarily using stop-motion techniques, which not only lends it a deliberately uncanny vibe but also allows for a seamless introduction of some absurdist visuals (crafted with plasticine). It's really convincing in its own way. This aesthetic consistency enhances the disturbing effect of some of the gags, as does the disgustingly precise sound design (if you don't like the sound of people eating, this isn't going to be a nice time for you). Some sections are more funny than frightening, even if the short is constantly conceptually unsettling and has a dark tone overall. There's definitely something off about the whole thing and this makes it a really compelling watch; it's the sort of thing you just can't look away from. It's a really well-made film that feels like it has something to say and a distinct way of saying it.

Fountain of Corpulence

[ionford · 7/10 · 31 August 2004]

This is an okay Svankmajer short that comes with Conspirators of Pleasure on the Kino DVD release.

It's worth seeing for that movie but seems much longer than it actually it is.

What's interesting is how each chapter seems to deliberately pare itself down in the level of detail given each chapter. The first segment, "Breakfast" is uniform in it's depiction of each actor's "meal". "Lunch" (the most obviously meaningful of the three) moves along a bit faster and "Dinner" just crams as many brief encounters into a couple minutes as possible.

Svankmajer, it would seem, is pretty serious about breakfast and pretty lazy by dinnertime, but I like Dinner the best.

7 out of 10

Darkly comical and unsettlingly spot-on... with food!

[Johnny-the-Film-Sentinel-2187 · 8/10 · 16 January 2024]

Food is like a surreal comedy horror that comments on humanity's relationship with food, all through the lens of Jan Svankmajer's filmmaking lens of stop-motion and live-action mixing, making up for some truly fever-dream-like stories! For a short film it's got a lot of story in its three brief sequences: Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner.

Food is probably one of the truest films about dining, and possibly one of the greatest criticisms of communism encouraging people 'eating off each-other' (at least that's my interpretation of the Breakfast segment); Lunch's critique of classism in that regard is also very sharp, and Dinner's indulgence of 'eating your own body parts' is comically dark stuff at its finest.

The 1990s were really a remarkable time for stop-motion cinema and Food was something of a radical film in a post-Wallace-&-Gromit world (A Grand Day Out was released in 1989). Also it was an achievement for the Czech Republic finally breaking free from its communist trappings and restrictions on filmmaking.

Food is good stuff; it's plentiful and satirical on what it's covering, and shows the cross-quadrant world of dining and how every experience says something about the consumer (and their priorities) and what they do to get by.

Food is a 4/5 star film. 8/10 IMDb points. It's not for everyone, but it certainly says a lot about all of us. It's like a cerebral stop-motion film. And a good one at that.

YUM

[alexnoble2002 · 10/10 · 11 May 2020]

Wow i love food a lot so this is cool. Love how they portray the texture of everything and Twin Peaks is a pretty cool restaurant. Blake goes there for his birthday and it's cool to see some so lookin #hot girls. It's interesting how it all connects to life

Gross and fascinating at the same time

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 10 September 2015]

This is "Jidlo" or "Food" a 16-minute animated short film by Czech filmmaking legends Jan Svankmajer. It is one of his later works and he was close to 60 when he made it. Last year he turned 80. This one here has basically a couple men sitting at the table during different times of the day, but instead of normally eating like everybody else they cause exactly that kind of mayhem that you'd expect in a Svankmajer film. They make the weirdest movies, eat their own clothes, eat body parts and just interact in the strangest manner one could imagine. It is fairly gross, but the fact that this is animation makes it watchable I guess. Still, it's a great display of Svankmajer's style, but i always have the problem with his films that I am somewhat looking for a story or an interesting plot and they almost never have these. Svankmajer is very much style over substance in my opinion and certainly not for everybody. That includes me. Not recommended.

Food is easily eaten, but challenging to digest.

[elmohead · 26 May 2000]

This film is one of the tightest most beautiful short films I have seen, as well as being one that truly forces you to think . From an animator who has delivered so many incredible films ,I see this as a true center piece for his constant trials with censorship authorities. Using food itself as a social commentary for poverty and oppression, Jan is able to make us both visually intrigued while still delivering an intellectual point,something rare in todays world of film.

A dark feast

[Rectangular_businessman · 9/10 · 1 July 2023]

The final short by Jan Svankmajer, and also the best one, in my opinion.

The "Lunch" segment, with the two diners eating absolutely everything on their table (And also all their clothes, and the table itself) it's the "main course" of the short, oscillating between dark comedy and horror.

It's a fascinating spectacle from beginning to end. Pretty weird, often grotesque, with a rather shocking ending.

A true macabre feast for the senses, and nightmarishly entertaining in a pretty unique manner.

Definately not for everyone, but I highly recommend it anyway.

Just be sure to not watch this while eating, unless you have a strong stomach.

A Nightmare

[Hitchcoc · 8/10 · 4 July 2019]

When I see something like this, I start to think of David Lynch. I've always contended that Lynch has made a career out of putting his nightmares on film. From Eraserhead to Twin Peaks we are haunted by the indifference of the world and the bizarre figures that inhabit it. This is all about the consumption of food, where everything we do is related to eating. But what this film does with gross but stunning animation is brings these strange things to us and perhaps create new nightmares. for us.

what can be eaten and how do we eat them

[liangdong · 2 October 2003]

The film goes as the summary tells but it is much more than that. Otherwise it would be another boring idea with no details. The major focus is on the lunch, other meals appearing to be only preface and epilogue, which is pacing faster and faster to reach a point of craziness at one time dumbfounding and mesmerizing. The contest and contrast between two diners are not on how fast we can eat but on what can be eaten and how do we eat them.

This short piece is a good example because the audience feels that it refers to something which cannot be clearly identified, thus allows for multiple explanations. You can substitute 'eat' with various other words, to see what you get there, and you are no where near the director's idea. Maybe he didn't have one at all!

Indigestible

[tedg · 27 October 2002]

Spoilers herein.

Svankmejer evolves. Or rather the two warring beings within his body become stronger. One of these is the visually creative mind we love. The other is the blunt moralizer we hate. That latter has no sense of humor, has no respect at all for the audience, and insists on pounding home his simple point.

Avoid this, it just encourages his evil self.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 4: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.